Meet the Herons

Simon Heron, the new Curate, and his family have arrived! Welcome Simon, Gill and family to All Saints Church, Frindsbury.

Historical Lecture, Flower Festival and Music Evening.

It seemed like a good idea last winter to have a weekend dedicated to celebrating the completion of the stonework at All Saints; A summer flower festival, a strawberry tea and a concert in the evening. It was a good idea but suddenly there were snags.  The weather so far this summer has been awful so the strawberry tea would probably have to be in the hall, not on the vicarage lawn. One of the flower groups who had promised to help with the flowers, withdrew.  We were struggling to find enough musicians to entertain for the whole evening.  The organ repair was not complete and bits of organ were still strewn around the north aisle. Tickets for all events were slow to be sold AND the stone work was not going to be finished!

So was it a disaster?    NO, it was a resounding success!

The Church was gloriously bedecked with thousands of flowers depicting hymn titles.  The colour and the  scent was breathtaking.  Thank you Brenda and flower ladies. The weather picked up and loads of people turned up to see the flowers particularly on Saturday when Derek Barnard returned to Frindsbury to give a talk on the history of the Church including a guided tour of the Church and tower.  As always Derek was informative and amusing.  Thank you Derek. At 4.00pm with the sun still blazing we were able to enjoy a wonderful strawberry tea in the Vicarage garden. Diets were forgotten as we all tucked into scones, strawberries and cream.  Thank you Jean King and the Social committee, also thank you to Ian & Julie for the use of your garden.

Then it was time for the concert.  Anne and Nigel ably compeered the evening starting by telling us to imagine we were at a festival like Glastonbury.  (The wellies looked great guys). The jokes from the bucket got things started then the music began. Alex and Avril sang three numbers and it was great to see Alex in his kilt. Kijana made the aisles rock.  We are so lucky to have so many talented youngsters in the Church family. Nigel Malcolm then played the newly refurbished organ (only completed on Thursday). Roger Green treated us to a comic song.  Frances then sang three numbers from classic opera to Amy Winehouse. Tim, James, Martin and Helen then raised the roof with three songs including something from McFly.  Then Flame closed the proceedings with a medley of Beatles classics ending with “Hey Jude”.  The atmosphere was great (no doubt helped by the wine in the interval).  Thank you to all those mentioned above and to Steve and David who put it all together.  A special thanks to Steve who planned, cajoled and probably occasionally bullied “the stars” to make a very special performance. Lastly a special thanks to Pam Cresswell who managed publicity, helped with the flowers and helped with the tea.

The total amount raised was £1500. A BIG THANKYOU TO EVERYONE INVOLVED.

Pentecost Service

Pentecost is when the Church celebrates the coming of the holy spirit to the disciples. All Saints and a number of Churches in the Medway celebrated with an All Age Service on Sunday 27th May. Roly Bain entertained us with his show and he was very funny.  He explained, through a christian story line, how he became a clown and the first tricks that he learnt. His off the cuff comments, riding a bike that fell apart, piercing balloons with a needle ( a very large needle that burst three balloons before he succeeded ) and finally his slack rope routine ( see picture below ) were brilliant and had us all laughing so much. 

After the service, Roly kindly held a Special Circus workshop. This was fantastic and we all had a go at some of Roly's tricks ( not the slack rope I hasten to add! ). You can see some of the pictures if you follow this link>>.

Roly Bain, the award winning clown has clowned all over the UK, the USA, in Canada, Australia, Sweden, France, Belgium and Holland. All his routines have a Christian basis ,story or punchline.

read more>>

Permission to use this photograph was kindly given by Roly Bain.

Sponsored Long Distance Walk

Jean and Derek King are back! and they walked more than the planned 194 miles. Money raised will be split evenly between The British Heart Foundation and the ‘Living Stones’ Church Restoration Fund. Well done Jean and Derek.  

Knitting contest

A Sponsored knit on Sat 21 April has raised £489 for the Living Stones appeal. Knitters had 20 stitches and had to see how far they could knit in 1 hour.  Well done to Pat Simmonds who completed the longest piece of knitting, closely followed by Mavis and to Iris who collected the most sponsors.